ASIC

September 2023 was a busy month for regulators in the financial services space. ASIC called on licensees to strengthen remediation procedures, issued new legislative instruments to replace sunsetting class orders, and released its 2023 annual licensing report. Meanwhile, APRA announced various new and proposed updates to its prudential standards and commenced consultation on a range…

The months of June and July have seen a flurry of regulatory developments. Treasury has committed to adopting the bulk of the Quality of Advice Review Recommendations, published its second consultation paper on climate disclosure and has announced its intention to uplift Superannuation Performance Testing. As expected with the close of the financial year, disclosure…

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has published a media release to confirm that the current transitional licensing relief for foreign financial services providers (FFSPs) providing financial services to Australian wholesale clients has been extended for a further 12 months to 31 March 2025.

FFSPs who held the benefit…

While the Financial Accountability Regime Bill 2023 (Cth) (Bill)is still before the Senate, APRA and ASIC (Regulators) have already released draft Regulator rules for consultation. The Regulator rules provide some guidance on what APRA considers a key function for the purposes of assigning responsibility to ‘accountable persons’.

If passed by…

This post was co-authored with Abhirami Ravishankar.

On 10 May 2023, following the Federal Treasurer’s Budget announcement of additional funding for ASIC’s greenwashing surveillance and enforcement work, ASIC issued two noteworthy publications providing guidance for market participants on how, and how not to, display their green credentials.

The first release was the ASIC Report 763 …

April was another fast moving month in the financial services sector. ASIC released updates to the breach reporting requirements to introduce new guidance and clarify existing guidance regarding reportable situations. The regulator also provided further communications surrounding the superannuation performance test, as well as commenced proceedings against an insurance company alleging unfair contract terms in…

The month March was a busy month which saw some significant developments in the financial services sector. Notably, ASIC is currently consulting on class orders about financial requirements in considering whether to remake certain class orders. The regulator is also consulting on ‘sunsetting’ class orders changing responsible entities and equal treatment. ASIC also granted conditional…

As 2022 came to a close, the regulators concluded the year with a busy month in December. Notably, ASIC ended the year by reminding stakeholders of the importance of ensuring that claims made in relation to a product were accurate, especially in the context of environmental claims, reflecting ASIC’s increased focus on greenwashing in 2022.

The month of July 2021 saw the release of various anticipated consultations for the financial services sector.

In this wrap-up, we feature:

  • ASIC’s consultation on the Financial Accountability Regime (FAR) draft bill which is set to improve the risk and governance cultures of the banking, insurance and superannuation sectors.
  • Guidance on hawking reforms

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